Sunday 23rd October – Wasted
What a ridiculous
waste of a day. I check-out of Platypus
and make my way to La Pinta Hostel. I
get there at about 12 noon to be told that I can’t check-in until 3 p.m. Columbia is going to be a struggle with the
language. The girl showing me around the
hostel knows zero English, and my Spanish is failing me at every turn. The guided tour involves me nodding at
whatever she says and hoping she hasn’t asked a question (she did several
times, we muddled through it). I hang
around and get caught up on a few things on the internet, it starts lashing at
about 2.30 p.m., finally get allowed into my room at 3 p.m. There’s one other person in my dorm and I
find it very hard to believe that my bed wasn’t ready the minute I first
stepped into the hostel. Now with the
weather being awful, I can do nothing else all day.
But the hostel is
really good. Very clean with hot showers
- definitely needed as the weather here is the coldest so far due of the
altitude of Bogotá – 2600m. A very
secure hostel, and it’s the little touches that make a place. Each room has a huge locker for storing
valuables – with a power socket in it.
Perfect as I can now charge all my stuff – laptop, phone, camera –
without having to be right beside it for a few hours. I know this sounds trivial, but it’s such a
good idea.
Think my time in
Bogotá will be limited as it’s not really grabbing me and need to head to Ecuador
and my next volcanoes.
Monday 24th October – The Umbrella Business
Time to find out
what Bogotá is really all about. After
lots of research last night and this morning I decide to hit the central area
around Plaza de Bolivar and visit a few museums. Museums are usually not what I’m drawn to,
but apparently the ones in Bogotá are worth a visit. But just as I’m about to leave I’m informed
by one of the people at the hostel that all museums are closed on a
Monday. This city is really starting to
bug me. But undeterred, I’m going to
explore.
I’m reliable
informed the walk from the hostel to the central area is about 45 minutes. That’s a good thing as I need to acclimatize
to this altitude – it gets hard to catch your breath after climbing stairs but
exercise is supposed to help with this.
After walking for an hour and no sign of anything I’m expecting to see I
decide to ask for directions. It’s easy,
‘¿Dónde está Plaza de Bolivar?’ The man
I ask gives me a blank look, so I repeat the question, ‘Ah, el banco’ he
replies and proceeds to give me very precise directions to the nearest
bank. I’m curious to know which word in
my question even sounded like ‘banco’.
After thanking him and ignoring everything he said, I trudge on, no clue
if I’m even walking in the right direction.
After about another 15 minutes, I spot four police officers standing on
a corner. Finally people who can help
me. I ask again, ‘¿Dónde está Plaza de
Bolivar?’. Yet again I’m greeted with
blank expressions from all four. I repeat
my question. In very broken English, one
replies, ‘The bank, it is to the left’
‘WHERE IN MY QUESTION DID I SAY BANCO?
WHERE IN MY QUESTION IS THERE EVEN A WORD THAT SOUNDS LIKE BANCO? TELL ME – WHERE? WHERE?’ Obviously I’m screaming this in my head as
annoying a Bogotá police officer is not high on my list of things to achieve on
my travels. I’m really starting to give
up on Spanish. It just gets so
demoralizing. But, after a few more hand
gestures and a map I finally make it to Plaza de Bolivar, exhausted after a one
and a half hour walk – but every minute was worth it.
On the walk down the
roads were hectic – people and cars everywhere – but as you enter the square,
that all disappears. The traffic is soon
a distant hum and the square is peaceful, except for the usual city dwelling
pigeons being fed my a few of the locals.
After a brief walk around, I leave the square to the east and walk along
a street that has high security all around.
I eventually find out that this is because it leads to the presidential
residence. Not knowing what any of the
signs say, I break all the rules – walking on pavements too close to the fence,
not going through the right entrances, photographing buildings I’m not allowed
to – each time getting a ticking off from a heavily armed guard.
After finishing my
wanderings I head into a sandwich shop for a bite to eat at which point a huge
rainstorm drenches the city. It’s brief,
but I have thankfully avoided it. Upon leaving
the shop I discover a much hawked item in Bogotá which I never knew about – the
umbrella. It’s insane. On every corner, at every bus stop, there are
people screaming, ‘Paraguas! Paraguas!’
People are bouncing up to you with rucksacks full of them. It’s impossible to avoid. It’s hard to believe there could be such a
high demand in a city that has rain all the time – surely everyone already has
an umbrella? The thought crossed my mind
that if I run out of money, I’ll make my way back to Bogotá and set an umbrella
business. But then I realised that
the market is probable already flooded.
After making it back
to the hostel I got what I had been craving for days – a hamburger. It tasted like manna from heaven after days
of rice, chicken and beans.
Tuesday 25th October – Columbian Gold
Walking around
Bogotá yesterday it was pretty clear that the street art is something
special. I saw a graffiti tour
advertised so decided to take it and find out all the details. But things didn’t go to plan. I arrived for the tour and only two people turned
up, so it was cancelled. Hopefully going
to try again on Thursday and hope more people turn up. So with no tour, myself and Marjan (the other
person that turned up) decide to check out the Museo de Oro – The Gold
Museum. It has been highly recommended
by both all the guide books and everyone else that has been in Bogotá. And it’s well worth it. It’s just amazing how much gold is there and
that all of it has come from Columbia.
Some of the pieces are so intricate, others are huge and seem to have
been used as body pieces or armour (I have no idea – I’m making
this up as most of the information was in Spanish and the English text was so
small I couldn’t read it). And to think
all this was created thousands of years ago.
After that we head
for coffee, drinks and a bite to eat and I now have loads of travel tips for Ecuador,
Peru and Bolivia from Marjan as she has already travelled through there.
When I get back to
the hostel I have a few drinks with Len and Antti, fail miserably at playing
darts, but get yet more ideas for my travels.
Len and Antti are both rock climbers – something I want to try out. After chatting to them for ages about it, I’m
hoping to go to Huaraz in Chile to take some lessons. The area is supposed to be stunning – high in
the Andes with massive mountains over 6000m.
Sounds like the perfect spot for trekking and learning to climb. Hope it works out.
Wednesday 26th October – Police Love
High on a mountain
overlooking Bogotá at a height of 3200m is Cerro de Monserrate and that is where
I go today. To get there I have to get a
cable car and after failing to find the main bus terminal I decide to take the
one hour walk into town. This becomes
interesting when I stumble across another student protest. London, San Jose, Bogotá – there seem to be
students protesting all across the globe and somehow I always seem to run into
them. It’s just a small protest so I make
my way passed and onwards to the cable car.
But just as I am about to get there I am stopped once more by another
student protest. This is getting
weird. Undeterred, I finally make my way
up to Cerro de Monserrate. The views
over Bogotá are fantastic. The city is
huge, something that you don’t appreciate when walking through its streets. The church is perched at the top of the hill,
but walking around the grounds I come across The Stations of the Cross. I’ve seen this in many churches, but this is
something special. It’s a
long-windy-uphill path (difficult to walk up at this altitude) with life-size
statues depicting each station. What
detracted from this a little bit were the lights and sparkly decorations being
put up around them for Christmas. A
weird juxtaposition of Christmas and Easter.
After walking
around, getting lost and constantly getting breathless I decided it was time to
head back. When walking to get the cable
car I could hear something from the city below, I wasn’t sure what, but there
was definitely something going on. When
I get back down to the city it all became clear. As I walk over to the main street I come face
to face with, yes, another student protest, but this is on a whole new
level. It’s crazy. There are thousands of students marching down
the street, chanting, spray painting the roads, banging drums, dancing. But it’s all peaceful so I stop to see it
pass by. At a large intersection there’s
a line of police officers dressed in riot gear so I decide that’s a good place
to view from. But a few minutes later a
group separate themselves from the main protest and race towards the police
line – which is about 5m from where I’m standing. What happened next was not what I
expected. The protesters, instead of
attacking the police, start hugging the police and the police start hugging
them back. It’s surreal. Then as I'm taking a photo I get grabbed from
behind. Not knowing what’s happening, I
pull back but realise it was just a few of the protesters grabbing me to join
in the hugging. This goes on for a few minutes before the
protesters rejoin the main march. Then a
few minutes after this the same thing happens except they run at a parked
police van, surround it and lay their hands on it – a few climb on top and wave
their banners. This is not the type of
protests I’m used to seeing. After
watching for another few minutes it’s time for me to head back to the hostel,
but I soon discover this is not possible.
Trying to walk in the opposite direction of the march is difficult, and
then I come across another police line.
A girl runs from the crowd and starts showering them with confetti. Then things take a nasty turn. A few missiles are thrown from the crowd at
the police, then paint (or a strawberry milkshake, not quite sure which). This is immediately met with jeers from
protesters and onlookers alike, and a lot of finger wagging and as quick as it
started the violent behaviour ends. But I am left in the situation of not knowing
whether to pass the police line in case it starts up again. Getting hit with a missile is not what I
want. But a free strawberry milkshake
would be nice. After a few minutes the
atmosphere has changed to the initial mood of happy protesting and I finally
make my way back to the hostel. During
all of this can be heard the faint shouts of ‘Paraguas! Paraguas!’
Back at the hostel
it was time for a BBQ, Antti and Len had
done the shopping, lit the fire, cooked the food, and I ate. My skills were the washing up. Great night with some metal music to help us
along the way. Tomorrow it’s time to do
the graffiti tour again and find a metal bar to get some decent music.
Thursday 27th October – Bogotá Graffiti Tour
Today the graffiti tour
happened. Len and Antti came along too so
we definitely had the numbers. It was
excellent. Christian (from Sydney but
now living in Bogotá) was the tour guide and had loads of details on the
different artists – their backgrounds, their styles, where they were from,
their collaborations. Seeing street art
and admiring it is one thing, but getting the extra details makes a big
difference. The tours started in the La
Candelaria area. Yesterday I had spotted
some graffiti I recognised from Barcelona and it turns out the artist, Pez,
is from Barcelona but has done work in Bogotá too. We then got a bus to another area near a
military base which has loads of space where the graffiti artists could show
off their work. Some of the work is amazing
- from the abstract tags to very simple but effective designs. If in Bogotá, do this tour. It’s the highlight of my time in the
city. Check it out here - http://bogotagraffiti.com/ - http://www.facebook.com/bogotagraffiti
In the evening, myself and Antti went on our mission for a metal
bar. No success at the start, but
finally stumbled across an extreme metal bar.
Goodbye reggaeton. After a while we
change to another bar and I get chatting to Marcela, a student in Bogotá, and ask
the full details of the protests yesterday.
After speaking to a few others as well, I discover that a few weeks ago
a similar protest turned very nasty and lots of damage was caused by the
protesters and a lot of confrontation with the police, so this time the
students wanted to make sure that didn’t happen and the reason for protesting
was reported, not the violence – so that’s what all the police love was about.
Today I booked my flight for Quito, Ecuador. I think I may have jumped the gun on that
decision. I’m really starting to like
Bogotá plus I have found out that Halloween, my favourite time of the year, is
huge in Columbia. But I have to move on
Friday 28th October – Quito Bound
Seriously, you could
not make this stuff up. I get to the
airport for my flight to Quito and check in.
All good. I get through immigration. All good.
I get to security, they scan my bag.
Problems. They are only
interested in one specific side pocket which they ask me to open. In this pocket I have a book, a small pair of
binoculars and a dome magnifying glass inside a leather pouch. I show the book and that’s not a problem,
they inspect the binoculars and hand them back.
Then she lifts the leather pouch with the magnifying glass in it. She slowly opens it, pulls back the
protective paper, stares at it and stares at me. At this point I am taken to another desk so
another security guard can inspect the mysterious item. I am obviously perplexed. Do they not have magnifying glasses in
Columbia? The new security guard slowly
takes it out of the case. I explain in
Spanish about my eyesight (I have learnt the perfect phrase for that). She puts it on her book and moves it across
the page. The expression on her face was
at the same time priceless and scary – I swear she thought some kind of black
magic had just happened to make the writing on her page all of a sudden become
larger. I am genuinely worried at this
point as to what will happen next. Then
holding the magnifying glass at arm’s length she carefully places it back in
the pouch and gingerly hands it back and lets me go on my way.
After an otherwise
uneventful flight, I get to The Secret Garden hostel in Quito. I immediately love this hostel. It has an amazing view over the city with a
really good roof terrace/bar. The staff
are friendly and there seems to be a good group of people in it. Finally a hostel that isn’t empty, which I’m
really glad about as I am now travelling on my own again. A girl Kia overhears me asking about ATMs and
offer to take me out to find one and have a walk around the city. This is a good hostel.
I spent the evening
having a few drinks on the roof terrace and then we all headed to an Irish bar
in the new town area. Normally I try to
avoid Irish bars as I prefer to experience the local bars, but it ends up being
a really good night.
The hostel is having
a Halloween party tomorrow night.
Perfect.
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